


Doubt

by yet_intrepid



Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: Gen, Religious Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-05
Updated: 2013-03-05
Packaged: 2017-12-04 08:50:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/708857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yet_intrepid/pseuds/yet_intrepid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Athelstan faces his first chaotic doubts in the wake of the Viking Raid.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Doubt

_Is this really your will?_

Athelstan was sinking into the dark and frigid waters of his own fearful heart, into depths of doubt that he had not known himself capable of.

_Where are you, Lord?_

A piece of him—the screaming, whimpering, whispering piece that he hated to acknowledge—was trying to answer that question instead of merely ask it. It cried out relentlessly, beating against his chest like his weary heart and tossing him about like the waves that crashed against the ship’s side: nowhere, nowhere, too far away to save, which is almost the same as nowhere.

_Is this really your will?_

Perhaps it is, came a hard voice in his thoughts. You have failed. You have sinned. The Lord is a God of mercy but also of righteous wrath, and perhaps it is only right that such wrath should be brought against you. Perhaps this is penance.

He shuddered at that, but he thought, but if only I could be sure. If only I could know instead of wondering. If this is penance, I will humble myself for it; if you have forgotten me, I will learn to live with that abandonment. But please, my God, let me not live in everlasting doubt. Let me know.

_Where are you?_

Athelstan longed, more than anything else, to have a pen in his hand and to lose himself in lettering, in beauty, in the familiar yet ever-fresh rhythm of copying the Holy Scriptures. It had always been a recourse for him before, in his periods of questioning or of spiritual dullness. To touch the words was to be one step closer to God.

But now, he realized, even that might not be enough to help his sinking, doubting, lonely soul.

_Is this really your will?_


End file.
